Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a method, an apparatus, and a storage medium for synchronizing data among a plurality of databases.
Description of the Related Art
Higher functionality of devices has been accompanied by the increased number of setting values, consequently requiring reduction of maintenance/management costs. Accordingly, there has been used a method for concentratedly managing the setting values in a master database (DB) on a network, and synchronizing the setting values from the master DB to an in-device DB by using a data synchronization technology. In the data synchronization technology, guaranteeing data consistency and improving data availability are in a trade-off relationship.
As a technology for controlling balance therebetween, for example, Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 11-219309 discusses a method for improving data availability by performing different consistency management according to the type of transaction. Meanwhile, Japanese Unexamined Patent Application Publication No. 2009-541882 discusses a method for enhancing both safety and response performance by comparing and evaluating processing costs of storing data in a low-speed nonvolatile memory with the risk of losing data when data is stored only in a high-speed volatile memory so as to determine a storage destination.
There have been largely two tasks in concentrated management of setting values. One is to place top priority on securing response performance to a user currently using a device, and the other is to quickly reflect, on the device, a change of a setting value made in a master DB. Nevertheless, in the aforementioned conventional technologies, the granularity in controlling the data consistency and the data availability has been per transaction, providing poor flexibility in selection of data to be synchronized.
Thus, it has been difficult to improve performance by performing optimization of preferentially synchronizing only data referred to by a currently executed application. This constraint has been a problem particularly in a case where a behavior of an application currently used by a user must be controlled by quickly applying, to the device, a change of a setting value relating to security or user authority.